Almost a third of TransPennine Express train services have been cancelled on a “dreadful” first full day of a winter timetable that is supposed to improve connectivity on key rail routes.
The timetable should have meant hundreds of extra trains added to Britain’s beleaguered rail network, including the resumption of three services an hour to and from Manchester to London on Avanti West Coast.
Labour said the “shambles” on Monday was entirely predictable and showed the government had been “staggeringly incompetent” in its dealings with the worst performing companies. Ministers must remove the contracts from failing operators, the shadow transport secretary, Louise Haigh, said.
Last month, the rail minister Huw Merriman said he was confident the timetable was deliverable, despite many warnings from inside the rail industry that it was completely unrealistic against a backdrop of work-to-rule industrial action and staff shortages.
The timetable obliged TPE to reintroduce services on the west coast mainline between Manchester airport and Scotland, direct trains between Hull and Liverpool, as well as the extension of the Cleethorpes services to Liverpool Lime Street via Warrington.
But the rail operator cancelled 115 trains in full or in part, amounting to about 32% of Monday’s planned services. As a result, trains that did run were “dangerously overcrowded”, according to Tracy Brabin, the mayor of West Yorkshire.
Eighty-eight were cancelled by 10pm on Sunday night, using what is known in rail industry jargon as “p-codes”. P-coded services effectively disappear from the timetable and do not appear in official statistics collated by the regulator the Office of Rail and Road. The UK Statistics Authority is investigating how rail statistics are collected and presented after a series of Guardian articles that have exposed the p-code loophole.
Avanti also cancelled many of its trains to and from London Euston on Monday, including two out of four direct services from Holyhead in Wales and many of the Manchester and Liverpool services.
It blamed the cold weather and sickness, with a spokesperson saying one train had to be taken out of service with a cracked windscreen.
“We are seeing some short notice cancellations to our services today due to the weather and sickness but are doing all we can to make sure our trains run. Despite this, the timetable step-up which came into force on Sunday means we are running significantly more services than last week,” said they continued.
“Despite this we expect to run between 30% more services today than on previous Mondays. If we take the Manchester route, that means just around 40 services departing for London today as opposed to 23 this time last week.”
Haigh said: “This shambles was predictable and predicted. Yet once again, ministers have been staggeringly complacent.
“Enough is enough. Passengers have been taken for a ride for too long. It’s time for ministers to wake up and hold operators to account for appalling performance, and a failure to invest in the long-term future.
“Without urgent improvement, they must begin withdrawing the contract.”
Brabin said: “It’s dreadful that just one day into the new rail timetable we’re seeing appalling levels of cancellations and dangerous overcrowding.
“The government promised to get a grip, but the chaos continues, and those of us in the north will be lucky to get a train home from work or college tonight. This can’t be allowed to drag on and ruin Christmas, as people will struggle to get to see family and friends.”
TPE said the timetable was designed to bring “a number of enhancements” for customers but involved “a huge amount of training for staff”, more than other operators.
“To help deliver resilience, and to allow training to take place alongside the running of passenger services, we have worked hard to recruit more traincrew to the business and currently have 507 active drivers – more than TPE has ever had,” said the spokesperson.
“However, we continue to experience traincrew availability issues as a result of continued high levels of sickness – which has seen a significant spike in recent days – and the unprecedented training backlog. As a result of these factors, the delivery of the timetable will be challenging from the outset and customers may experience disruption to their journeys.”
